Floats, throws, costumes and King Cake — that’s what most people know about Mardi Gras in New Orleans. But there’s another side of Carnival that only select locals get to experience, the ones who ride or march with a secret society, called a krewe. For visitors who want to learn more, a few off-the-radar museums will let you in on the magic and the mystery of this most New Orleans of holidays.

Backstreet Cultural Museum

Just a block and a half from Louis Armstrong Park, the Backstreet Cultural Museum, located in a somewhat timeworn three-room house, showcases all the elements of black Mardi Gras, which celebrates the traditions, artistry and resilience of the people who were historically kept out of mainstream Mardi Gras. Visitors can get an up-close look at the intricately beaded suits worn and sewed over the course of a year by Mardi Gras Indian chiefs; memorabilia and outfits created by Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs, community organizations that grew out of the “benevolent societies” of the 1800s; and the frisky outfits of the so-called Baby Dolls, women who dress like baby dolls in honor of the disenfranchised prostitutes of black Storyville in the early 20th century. Museumgoers can also learn about jazz parades, jazz funerals and second lines. The $10 fee is worth it, if not for the guided tour, which may leave you with more questions than answers, but for the exhibits, which document and explain a culture that is still thriving more than a century after it began.

Backstreet Cultural Museum
1116 Henriette Delille Street. Tel. (504) 657-6700